Parkland Shop Project Goes Like Clockwork

May 05, 1988|by STAN SCHAFFER, The Morning Call

Parkland High School woodworking students are taking time to make timepieces.

Actually, the students are making Bedford ("bracket") clocks, a type of mantel clock that can be carried from room to room. The timepieces are in various stages of completion, but the finished product is a handsome walnut clock that would look rich in any living room.

The 23 students, under the guidance of Jeff Geisel, an industrial arts teacher, developed a set of plans, fixtures and jigs for various machines so they could "mass" produce about 30 clocks.

"The idea of the course was to show (the students) what would be entailed if they went into a small business. Small businesses, like the type that might be found in a home, are sprouting up all over," Geisel says.

"It's a small-scale mass product experimental class to see how it works. In the future, the project may be run every other semester," Geisel says.

Initially, the students were not happy about making a clock. They wanted to make their own projects.

"After a while they felt better about it. But we'll complete this mass production project. They can make what they want in the second half of the semester," Geisel says.

"Yes, I liked making the whole clock," Alyson Orphanides, 18, a senior, says.

"It was interesting. I learned something new. I never made a clock before. I made it; I'm going to keep it."

First, the students had tp cut out all the pieces for the clocks. Now, they are mitering corners and sanding parts in preparation for covering the completed clocks with penetrating oil to bring out the rich walnut grain.

The student may keep a clock if he pays $17, which covers the district's cost of woodand the internal mechanism. The quartz movement is powered by a small battery. Geisel's finished clock has been running on a battery installed in December 1986. A student may also sell the clock to get the money back the district spent for materials.

"I'll buy it for myself to give as a gift," says Mike Rau, a 16-year-old junior.

Rau has made shelves and cabinets for his home, but it's the first time he has made a clock.

"I like how it turned out. It turned out well. I'd probably make another one if I had the time," he says.

A 16-year-old sophomore, Kyle Jermyn says, "I liked working with the machines," and that he is going to keep his clock.

Throughout the course the students work with routers, shapers, table saws, band saws, drill presses, files, chisels and sanding. The students also learn safety rules and proper machine operation.

"The project covers the use of all the major machines in the shop. If they can work each day and produce a lot of parts and switch to the different machines, they will be more adept at using the machines," Geisel says.

The plans for the clocks came with the internal mechanism, which was ordered from a catalog. The students altered their plans to suit the shop's jigs, fixtures and method of construction.

The students began the project the last week of January and spent most of February developing the drawings for the project. Work on building the clocks did not start until mid-March.

Once the plans were made, the class could make 30 clocks in about three weeks. Because most of the students are neophytes, it takes about a half a semester - two and a half months - to make that many clocks. The time includes learning the rules, safety procedures and machine operations.

The finished piece is about 10 inches wide and 12 inches high.

The bracket clock got its name fromearlier days in this country when a person had only one clock and needed a handle on it so it could be carried from room to room.

"It's a reproduction of that type of clock except for the quartz movement. We used a quartz movement because a windup movement would have been cost-prohibitive," Geisel says.

The only problem encountered in the project was that some students accidentally picked up parts belonging to other students. Each student has to finish his own clock. Storage of the clocks, more of a facility problem, was a concern because of the possibility of the clocks being bumped or knocked over.

A Whitehall Township resident and Lehighton native with four years of teaching experience, Geisel, 27, is in his first year at Parkland. He had been teaching in Muncy, Lycoming County.